The Silence (Dc Goodhew 4) (28 page)

But his subconscious brain was a totally different kind of thinker, remaining quiet until that very second, the moment when the last part of the plan locked into place and it could be trusted with the answer.

The answer which had blown in from Stourbridge Common.

She was still astride him, didn’t seem to care that he’d been staring blindly at the window for the last few minutes. He wondered if she had any purpose in life except getting screwed by a succession of men and nursemaiding a succession of animals.

He pushed her off him and on to the bed.

‘Don’t get like that,’ she sulked.

There was a small tub-chair in front of the window.

‘I want you to kneel in front of that.’

‘Why?’ Again the flirty, overgrown child voice.

‘You want me to tell you something to turn you on?’

‘Uh-huh.’ She gazed at him seductively. Shit, now he’d used the quote fingers. This whole situation was weak and sleazy and pathetic and he wanted out.

‘You’re going to feel how it was to be one of those Stourbridge Common ladies. Now get on your knees.’

And just like that she did. He slid into her from behind, pushing her face down on to the chair seat and thrusting hard.

He stared out of the window, determined not to listen to her fake moans, her cries of ‘yes’ and the pretence that she was too tired to carry on. The Common was all he cared about; the sinister distortion of Cambridge didn’t intimidate him now. It had given his subconscious every answer. Even the new children’s playground down there, with its Pied Piper sparkle in the heart of this throwback corner had fed him.

He came quickly, pulling out at the last moment and letting it shoot on to the small of her back and dribble back along the channel between the flat-faced cheeks of her arse.

He kept the side of her face pressed to the seat of the chair, pushing her jawbone so it would be easier for her not to speak. If she started pushing him to tell her why he never ejaculated inside her and chipping at him with a new set of questions about upbringing, relationships, and on, and on, he thought he might lose it. Right now he needed to be alone in his head.

Her own head moved a little under his fingers, and her one visible eye was straining back to look at him. He released his grip slightly. She was nodding vigorously.

‘What?’ he demanded.

‘I will, I will,’ she sobbed.

‘Will what?’

‘Be quiet and give you headspace.’

He let go entirely then and she sagged on to the carpet, head down staring at the floor. Silent now as promised.

He stopped noticing anything in the room; he only needed to look out at the Common to feel calmness. Then clarity. Then he allowed himself his second thought.

The women took the men in carriages because the fair had rules against bad behaviour. The fair was for commerce, and every trader had their set of rules. Ale had to be sold in specific quantities. Meat had to be of good quality and bread a certain weight.

These rules would be announced at the start of every fair in a proclamation called the Cry.

Okay, the history was interesting – up to a point – and he never would have found it but for the discovery of this woman and the Common she lived beside. But, in the end, it all distilled down to four words: one line proclaimed in the Cry that repeated itself constantly in Nobby’s ear. ‘
Under pain of forfeiture.
’

The photo, those words, the names, the playground and even Myrtle the dog locked into place.

Under pain of forfeiture.

The baker loses his stock, the butcher his meat and the potter his wares. Punishment not only to fit the crime, but punishment that cuts to the very heart of what the poor man needs in order to survive.

After a while he pulled Connie back on to the bed. She had been crying quietly but didn’t say much for a while.

He didn’t begin telling any lies, but he apologized in any case, and she thawed out quickly after that – which made him smile. She smiled back at him, the stupid cow.

‘Can I adopt Myrtle?’

Connie’s face clouded. ‘She’s my favourite. And the oldest.’

‘I like her.’

‘You know about the vet’s bills, right? You’ve been listening?’

He shot her a glance of mock warning.

‘One of the others would be easier.’

‘Myrtle,’ he said firmly. ‘Perhaps I’ll change her name.’

‘No!’

He had laughed. ‘I’m joking. And I know she’s an expensive dog to keep alive. You don’t need to worry.’

Nobby now re-rolled the photograph. His mind was filled with thoughts that flared and flickered and darted through his head. Sometimes he really struggled to keep them in check.

Both Myrtle and Connie had been dead since late in the autumn of 2007 – September, he guessed, so why think of them now?

He pulled himself up short.

Only two more deaths and he’d be done.

Libby, Declan – then he could rest. To kill Libby right away didn’t trouble him, but Declan wasn’t due for another three years, and that made him uncomfortable. Nobby had only to turn his face towards the city centre to feel that change was in the air. And that meant time was running short. It was adjustments and compromises that had kept him ahead throughout. Forget the old plan then; their time had come now.

Libby’s Facebook page popped up to show that she had one new message. She’d never been a huge Facebook user, not one of those collectors of a thousand or more ‘friends’, none of whom they actually knew. She had seventeen – classmates in the main. Jamie-Lee had defriended her yesterday: that was okay, she understood. Meg’s page had been turned into a wall of condolence and was packed with messages like
Miss you babes
from a bunch of other students. Mostly strangers. It prompted Libby to defriend Meg.

She was still friends with Matt and Charlotte, of course, and assumed the new message would either be from one of them or else an invitation to a gig from someone else.

She saw Zoe’s photo appear first, and had to force herself to stop staring at the image and actually click open the message.

Talk to me Libby
, was all it said.

She released the mouse but kept staring at the screen, imagining for one moment that more words were about to appear. ‘Oh shit,’ she mumbled.

Unless it was a joke. Like a practical joke. Obviously not a funny one.

No, that didn’t make sense. Who would know that she’d been sending messages to Zoe? Who else even knew who Zoe was?

Libby’s heart began to thump, because any one of her friends could see her other friends. Charlotte would have seen Zoe at school, and if she’d seen the photo she would have recognized the tragic meningitis victim from the year above. In being clever, Libby had overlooked the obvious. She scanned her list of friends again; only Matt and Charlotte had been to the Manor School. Zoe’s profile was closed; no one except Zoe’s friends could see her friends and Zoe’s friends totalled exactly one. On top of that, no one would know about the messages. Unless they’d logged on as Zoe.

‘Oh shit,’ she muttered again.

Libby’s mobile was next to her keyboard. She could ring Matt and ask him whether . . . whether what?
Hi, Matt, I’ve set up a Facebook account in the name of a dead girl my sister knew. I did it so I could talk to her, because I don’t feel able to bother you or my mum and dad. Why not? Because you’re all too screwed up and I need to stop myself going mad.

She rested her fingers on her phone in any case, wondering who else might have been able to access her laptop and Facebook account. With her laptop it was easy: her usernames and passwords all auto-filled. Even without her laptop it wouldn’t be so hard. Her password for everything except her online banking was RosieB1.

She opened her bedroom door and called downstairs. ‘Mum? Have you been on my laptop?’ She waited for a reply. ‘Mum?
Mum!
’

She went and found a note on the kitchen table.
Gone to Dr’s
.

Libby turned her mobile over in her fingers. She was tempted to ring her mum and ask why she didn’t even communicate when they were living under the same roof. She guessed she’d first be diverted to voicemail.

Her mum had swung from the over-anxious parent to the frequently detached one. Overall, Libby preferred to stand clear in case there was going to be a major swing back again.

She pulled a can of Pepsi from the fridge, opened it, then left it on the kitchen table untouched. She was already dialling Matt’s mobile and had made it halfway up the stairs by the time he answered.

‘Are you okay?’ It was always the first thing he said.

‘Yeah, fine. I just wondered whether you used my laptop when I was staying over at yours?’

‘Might have, I suppose. Could’ve checked emails or something.’

‘Oh.’

‘Isn’t it working?’

‘No, no, it’s fine.’

‘What, then?’

‘It’s like someone’s been into my Facebook page. D’you think Charlotte . . . ?’ She let the sentence fade away as soon as she realized how stupid it sounded. ‘I mean, if she’d wanted to access Facebook, I’m not saying she’d snoop into my account or anything.’

‘Why would she even go on your laptop when she’s got her own? What’s going on, Libby?’

Behind her was her open bedroom door, and from beyond that she could hear the familiar plinking of an incoming chat message. Then another, and another.

‘Are you messaging me, Matt?’

‘No.’

‘Someone’s just sent me three or four.’

‘Who?’

‘Don’t know. I’m not in my room, I can just hear the messages coming in.’

She moved quietly to the top of the stairs and across the landing.

Plink. Plink. Plink.

She stopped at the doorway so Matt wouldn’t hear that she was close enough to see her laptop. But even from there she recognized Zoe’s profile picture. ‘Look, Matt, I need to go.’

She crossed her room and was in front of the screen as another message appeared. Each was one character in length and the message feed filled the right-hand side of her profile page. She scrolled to the top, and down again.

She replied,
Hi.

‘Libby?’

Yes, who is this?

‘Zoe.’

Okay, no point in asking that again.
What do you want?

‘Just to chat. I read the messages you sent me.’

And?

‘I feel really sorry for you. I know how much it hurts.’

I can’t keep talking to you when I don’t know who you are.

‘You were happy talking to Zoe, so why not to me?’

The replies stopped, then the silence in the room was broken only by the sound of her own breathing. It was heavy – almost panting – and when she looked at her fingers still poised over the keyboard, the tips were visibly shaking.

Zoe’s status changed to
no longer online
.

In one of the gardens nearby, a lawnmower was running, and further away still, the sound of the main road hummed constantly. Inside this house nothing moved. The air stagnated around her and even Libby’s college life seemed too distant to belong to her.

The dead house would have been disturbed by the ticking of a clock if the batteries hadn’t packed up and been left to leak for at least a couple of years. When changing two AA batteries turned into an insurmountable task for any one of the three occupants, it seemed clear to Libby that they were well and truly fucked. With a capital F.

A clear but quiet click reached her from downstairs. Could’ve been the noisy thermostat on the freezer – it sounded similar, but Libby wasn’t convinced. She moved close to her bedroom door.

‘Hello?’ Her voice sounded small and wispy, it always seemed to sound that way when no one was listening.

She hesitated in the doorway for several seconds more. She was alone – and she didn’t need to search downstairs to prove it. That’s what she told herself, in any case. ‘Mum? Is that you?’

She peered over the banisters as far as she could into the sitting room and the kitchen. Both doors were only half open.

She entered the kitchen first; its back door led out into the garden. She checked and it was locked. She exhaled and almost laughed out loud. Weird Facebook chat was one thing, but it didn’t turn into a real-world situation. Even so, she still paused to listen some more. And that’s when she heard the slight but distinct squeak of a shoe on the floor.

Oh fuck.

Libby rushed towards the front door, but as she passed the sitting room she saw a shadow move and darken the wall. She grabbed at the latch, but her fingers were suddenly too weak and stupid to open it. Someone was behind her and she had to get out. She held the interior handle and rattled it, just as it gave way and opened towards her.

Matt pulled her out into the fresh air. ‘Libby, Libby, speak to me.’

Those words again. ‘Did
you
send me those messages?’

‘Libby, forget Facebook. I just heard you shouting.’

‘Someone’s in there. I heard them.’

‘Who?’

‘I don’t know. I heard a noise, then saw movement in the front room.’

Matt pushed the front door open and crept into the hallway. Libby followed. ‘We should stay outside,’ she urged.

‘No.’

Matt walked into the sitting room, then straight back out again. ‘There’s no one there, Libs. What exactly did you see?’

She pointed to the far corner, ‘A shadow over there.’

‘Like a silhouette?’

‘No, just a dark blur. I’d heard something and ran for the front door – I just caught a glimpse.’

‘Then I arrived?’

She nodded.

‘Could it’ve been my shadow from outside?’

‘No.’ She shook her head, but wasn’t so sure now. ‘I definitely heard someone move.’

He slid his arm round her and she rested her head on his shoulder. He led her through the kitchen and turned on the kettle, all the time holding her tight with one arm.

‘Coffee, then?’ he asked.

‘Thought it was supposed to be sweet tea you needed for shock?’